More Awesome Than You!

OK here's the problem:

I had a teenager who stopped having the option to go to school (public).  When the bus came (for her younger brother - a child), she didn't get prompted to get on it and when I selected her a tried to click on it, I got the 'no actions possible' message.  I thought she was just bugged and as it was a Thursday and she was due to go to college at the weekend, she just stayed home for a couple of days and then went off.  Her A+ rating didn't drop.

That was fine.  As I said, I thought it was just a bug for that sim.  BUT I then went on to play another household with three teenagers and the problem repeated itself but with only one teenager - the oldest.  The other two went off to school just fine.  I have been trying to work out why.

I checked with SimPE (again because I did that with the girl too) and yes, he is coded as a teenager - he's shown as a teenager in game and has all the normal teenage options and information, wants and all the rest - he has an A+ rating for his (private) school and a teen-elder job. 

I wondered whether it might be a hack or a conflict between hacks.  I admit I have several hacks in my game - well, alright quite a lot of hacks (though I bet not as many as some of you).  Or is this a known bug that in all my avid reading I have simply not come across?  I pulled out all the most recent hacks I had installed but it made no difference.  I have been all over this site (and others) to see if there is anything I missed in the hack descriptions but I can't see anything that is related (except maybe Inteenimator conflicting with something?  If a female sim becomes pregnant, her schooling is suspended till the baby comes).  I did think about Inge Jones' school hacks, which can affect the school bus, but haven't yet installed them in my game.

I have made some progress though.  Noting that this teenager was the oldest of three (he had 7 days to go till he aged - I normally run my teenagers for their full time) - and that it was just before she went to college that I noticed the other teenager stopped school, I changed his age with SimPE making him a day younger.  Bingo - off he went.  So it's something related to age.

Does anyone have any idea what might be causing this?  Or have I missed something?  It was a lot of effort getting him in to private school and, as far as I'm concerned, he's damn well going to go.  Thanks for any help.

Yeah, I bet it's inteen. Inteen allows teenagers to be younger than 18 and older than 18. Older than 18 and they graduate HS and are able to get adult jobs and the like. Your kids must have graduated from HS. The hot fix will ensure they don't lose the grades scholarship (and I guess their grades don't go down as yours didn't).

Just so happens, I just installed this hack so I read everything really recently :)

This happened to me too, and it is inteen- if you don't like it, install the "no adult teens" flavor pack

Yep - read the Inteen documentation. At the late teen stage, they can skip school. If you don't like this and want them to continue going to school, there is a flavor pack you can install.

Maxon, you aren't alone. I also missed reading (or read and didn't understand) InTeen's graduation from HS thing. At least you checked with SimPE and otherwise went looking. I assumed it was me/my game/the lot/the sim as the teen was the oldest of ten (three teens and seven toddlers) on the lot. Don't ask. I nuked the whole lot and THEN read the RTFM. Sigh. Live and Learn.

That's odd - I installed Inteen absolutely ages ago and only noticed this effect in the last week.  I've been having teenagers go to school right up until they left for college until now.

Thanks for all replies.  You're probably right but how it came about I don't know.  Blast.

Could you maybe have removed or moved the flavor pack that makes them act just like Maxis teens? The flavor packs need to be in the same folder with inteen to work properly - maybe it just got moved out or something, or deleted by accident?

If you want to keep that Flavor (yuck spelling) Pack but want to send that particular sim to school perhaps because of low grades, then you can always have them drive to school once you have NL - and a spare car.

What a fine coincidence to find this thread :) That problem first appeared in my Legacy families.
I never imagined that InTeen had anything to do with it.

To those who were also affected ... were you able to send the teens to school by car instead of using the bus?
That was my work-around so far, buying them a car and car-pooling to school.

Yep - the car option will work. Also installing the flavor pack will allow them to go to school on the bus (no adult teen flavor pack).

Yes, thanks Sagana.  I just thought of that and came back to say so to find you'd all been talking about it.  I've been having a clear out recently and I have problems with nervous twitching (it's a neurological thing) - it's not at all unlikely that I grabbed the file while looking at the Inteen folder and moved it by accident.  I installed Inteen a really long time ago and although I did read the documentation then, I can't remember even a quarter of what it said (memory problems are also neurological thing!!).  I'll either have to try and find out where I moved the file to or dig out the original zipped download and reinstall it.  I love inteen - it's a cracking hack.

Yup - I've just checked the original Inteen documentation and looked in my folders and indeed the noadultteens pack is missing.  So I've put it back and problem solved.  I knew if I asked here someone would be able to point me in the right direction.  Thanks everyone for your help.

that's exactly what I would have done and I don't have any reasons :) The only way I remember what the docs for inteen say is cuz I just installed it yesterday (and I did read them... well most of them... well... basically, first.) By tomorrow I won't remember it properly and next week I won't remember it at all :)

I'm very glad you've got it working again.

You had a problem with a teenager, and it never occured to you that InTeen might have something to do with it?  ::)

Altogether now - YUCK YUCK YUCK.  Oh, I do so LOVE this quote.  Let's all ADD THE YOO.  Wanna learn more about the YOO?  Go here: http://www.wittywoman.com/yoos.html

Sorry, have to advertise my wares now and again.  Take another set of lips.  The YOO is worth it. 

Tee hee - yus, I cudn't agree more.

Everytime somebody installs the Inteenimator, God kills a kitten. How does it feel to know you just caused the death of an innocent kitten, you murderer?

Think of the poor kittens!

I feel so pure!
I only have awesome hacks and a couple by Monique at MTS2.

No kittens on my conscience.

Complete bollocks - go on rip me

pfft

No no no no, no.
When will people get this?
It's the "Dogs Bollocks", or the "Cats Whiskers".
Not the Kittens Bollocks.

Um, wouldn't it actually be
Dog's Bollocks or Cat's Whiskers

Punctuation is Important!!

Well Ill take you're word for it as you are a teecher, and making a pyle of howmwork as we right :)

That possessive rule always confuses me.  It parses as "Dog is Bollocks".
Is "Dogs' Bollocks" OK if there is more that one dog though?

All you idiot teens that aren't attending school, stick around...

;D  You are so funny! Stop bullying Jase - you know his mod is awesome, JM.  :P

LOL, good that I don't have this hack, otherwise I'd commit a suicide  [kitten in a glass]  ;D ;D ;D

Very funny, JMP!

Witches love the little kittens,
All the kittens of the world.
Be they boiled or baked or fried,
barbequed or on the side.
Witches love the little kittens of the world

(Apologies to C'thulhu - I just haven't quite made it past the Little Mouse stage with children just yet)

*ElfPuddle pulls her librarian glasses to the tip of her nose and looks over the edge*
The possesive s rule is:
With most singular nouns, add an apostrophe and s to form the possessive. (This is ElfPuddle's book. That is George's desk.)
When forming a contraction with is or was, take out most of the verb, push the s close to the previous word, and use the apostrophe to substitute for all the missing letters. (This is fun. This's fun. Dog is Bollocks. Dog's Bollocks)
The possessive rule gets futsy when dealing with words that end in s or es, whether plural or singular. (Have you read Confucius' teachings?)
The biggest issue with possesive 's is with it. The book belongs to it...its book...no apostrophe. There's always an exception to the rule. For more information, visit your local High School.
*removes glasses and puts away teacher's key*
You may now continue with your usual lives. :)or lack thereof ::)

Edited to fix poor typing....I can't answer student questions and type at the same time. :-\

Easy wasy to remember...

The apostrophe in it's ALWAYS replaces  the i in is so it is never, ever possessive.  It when it's possessive is its.
So when proof reading your writing, read it's as 'it is' and if it doesn't make sense, then you've used the wrong spelling. Use its instead.

I used to hang out on the newsgroup alt.possessive.its.has.no.apostrophe, and that's what I chant whenever anyone asks me for advice.


Did you write that article? It's hilarious!

Downloading the Inteenimator kills kittens?  Oh well.

It's jase's fault that people kept bugging him about the inteenimator, people online are lazy and never want to read anything.  Heck, there's people that don't even capitalize their sentences.  It would have been smarter for him to just make a bunch of hacks like J.M. has done which each has a unique feature that doesn't depend on another.  Probably easier said than done though, since most functions of that thing rely on the WooHoo portion.

I used to use the thing, but then decided that I never even used much of the functions that are unique to it.  If I decide I want those features later, I might reconsider downloading the thing.  The fact that it conflicts with part of Pescado's Clothing Tool and the fact that it won't be updated make me wary of downloading the thing.

This is an interesting example, because out of context there's no way to know whether Dog's Bollocks means bollocks belonging a dog, or that the dog is bollocks. I've never seen this is contracted to this's—surely this is bad form if not literally bad grammar (or more correctly, poor grammar)?


For simplicity, I use the style recommended by The Chicago Manual of Style ([perhaps the foremost authority on American English usage, the MLA not withstanding):  's after s in the singular. Examples:  "That is Charles's car." "I read Anne Stokes's book." If there were more than one Charles involved, the correct form would be "That is the Charles' car"—this is the way you know whether there is one Charles (Charles's) or more than one (Charles').

 ;D

In general, I would never use "this's fun". Having said that, however, I believe it's technically correct. I've never seen a rule to the contrary at any rate. It just sounds plain wrong unless you've been reading a lot of Shakespeare recently. I have, so....
...as for 's after s...
The textbooks I use in class (which are copyright 2004 and tend towards MLA), use the rule I gave. I've seen rule/guidebooks contradict each other. I'm starting to believe that, like many other punctuation rules, the possesive s after a singular s rule (my Confucius, your Charles) used to be one way and is currently changing to another for the stupidity of many writers simplicity of use. The fewer rules, and the fewer exceptions to the rules, the better. Or some such. All I know for certain is that one of my collegues will throw you through a window if you attempt to put an apostrophe s after her last name (yes, it ends in s).

I didn't say dog's I said complete.

maxon, you wrote complete bollocks.
We all saw you do it.  Don't try to wriggle out of it now  ;)

The Chicago Manual certainly leans toward the more traditional, which one could interpret as "more correct." The MLA tends to cater to the lazy writer, as for example in its endorsement of inline citations rather than real footnotes in order to get writers (particularly in Lit) to use citations at all. Although it is true that languages are evolutionary, it is also true that simply disregarding the rules of grammar isn't just a slap at musty conformity, it's also an assault on meaning and understanding. That many language rules exist largely for aesthetic reasons is undeniable (and we are all better off for it), but they also serve to maintain a common understanding of the words that make up a language and the ways in which they are used. And of course a side-effect of semi-literacy is that incoherent speech (and writing) is frequently an indicator of incoherent/incompetent thinking.  :)

That inline thing irritates me. I grew up in chicago and moved to VA when I was 15- so I learned to use footnotes and such, but after the move, I was always told to use MLA format. I hate the way the in-text citations break up the flow of things.

It conflicts with the optional package (I forget which one specifically) that affects how university sims are dressed when they return home or something.  It should not conflict with the main package mod, however.

Sure alot cheaper than spaying and neutering.

Good to know I can do something about our feral cat problem beyond just neutering my own cat.  *uninstalls and reinstalls inteen a few times*

I'm split exactly in half ...
Half of me (Elf) agrees with you completely. Parenthetical citations were certainly easier, even for the deepest thinkers, when we were still using typewriters. Footnotes then were, in my humble opinion, a creation of the devil. Now that "typing" has been replaced by "keyboarding", however, footnotes are just as easy as the proverbial pie. As parenthetical citations do disrupt reading, I wish we'd all return to footnotes.
Semi-literacy as incoherent thinking? Absolutely! I don't believe you can claim to understand a work unless you understand the nuances, allusions, and all the rest that comes with real literacy and deep thinking.
The other half (Puddle) thinks the other way. Certainly we have to keep part of our language stable to maintain understanding. What's the point of communication otherwise? But semi-literacy is better than a-literacy and il-literacy, both of which I am constantly battling in my students.
For the sakes of those that have neither the desire nor the ability to attend college, let alone spend evenings reading government reports, Shakespeare, or anything at all, I say, "Hell yes! Make it simple!" If it's simple, they'll do it, and isn't that the point?

*ElfPuddle briefly battles with self over which half is correct.*

Nope, I don't have an answer. Maybe we just compromise...Those of us who know what's right should continue our standards and scream at those who can't tell the difference between there, their, and they're, or at those who say "I seen that." But as long as they remember to cite their sources IN SOME MANNER, we let them live.

I actually prefer having the abbreviated reference right there in the text, at least for scientific works.  If it says something like "early studies seemed to indicate these effects were caused entirely by the gamma radiation (Jones, Begonia and Brown, 1995), but later experiments with heat stress caused similar phenotypes to occur in the second generation (Jones and Begonia, 1997)" then I can actually get a lot from the references themselves.  That it seems to be the same research group, and the time scale they're talking about.  Footnotes just mean I'd have to stop sometimes two or three times per sentence and try to find who/when they're talking about.  I guess it's just practice but I don't find the parenthetical references at all jarring anymore, the sentence still flows in my head and the reference turns into a kind of associated tag. But a "studies indicate" kind of statement where I have to go hunting for the details is going to frustrate me and make me mistrust the source.

When I was a doing an undergrad research assignment one guy's name kept appearing at least once in every article on the subject after 1994, even though a lot of the references were minor.  Even when I was skimming over stuff (so I wouldn't have bothered with footnotes or full references), I kept seeing his name somewhere.  It would have taken me a lot longer to realise how important his work was with less obvious indicators that he was The Man, since his papers were originally published in Portugese and didn't show up in my searches.  (I also learned that one semester of Spanish did not really improve my ability to read Portugese by any significant amount, but that was a whole different problem.)  I like that after just browsing in an area for a while you start to recognise the big names and when it was all going on just from the references in the text.

Yes, I am an enormous dork.

My dog doesn't have complete bollocks - what are you saying?

Touché Maxon  ;D You win, I give up.

I'm following this thread as these literary heavyweights are learning me to write properly.

Mistakes like that annoy me even more than the whole "your, you're, their, there, they're".
"Friends, Romans, Countrymen, borrow me your ears."

Coward


Sit up straight and pay attention then.  Personally, I use literary heavyweights to prop open the door but then I'm a Philistine (an unrefined, rude person: barbarian, boor, chuff, churl, vulgarian, yahoo - ah, Roget is your friend.  I've always wondered why Yahoo chose that name.  Um, I seem to have wandered off topic.  I'm going to talk to the dog about a man).

Parenthetical references are fine as long as it's just a reference. A full-fledged explanatory footnote (usually the most interesting part, as it's likely to be an idea not well-enough proved to be in the actual text) imo opinion belong at the bottom of the page (and none of it should be endnotes or chapter notes :p)

So many of our rules come from archaic processes or whatnot. A period or comma belongs (originally at least - it's been changing) inside of the parentheses to keep the little type from falling off when typesetting :p Written or spoken, language is about communication. If a spelling difference or error or grammatical mistake confuses or obscures, it's wrong. If it doesn't <shrug> no biggie and no sense fussing over it. Sometimes it adds flavour or color even. Responsibility for reading comprehension and writing to the audience divides equally between audience (to try and understand) and author (to attempt to express in terms the intended audience can understand).

My use of semi-literacy was meant to include these as well. For me, being able to write your name and read the sports page, and nothing else, is essentially illiteracy even if it isn't technically so.


Make it simple, easy, unchallenging, stupid, empty:  the mantra of our modern culture. If it takes any effort at all, it can't be worth the bother.


Scientific and technical writing are of course special cases. As you implicitly suggest, specialists in a technical field are likely to be familiar with a certain body of work which may not need a full citation, or a particular paper may rely on only a few sources. But as sagana notes, in non-scientific writing, footnotes often contain a lot more than just a reference, and remain the first choice. Endnotes are convenient for publishers and remain a less-than-satisfactory second choice, and inline citations remain the refuge of the intellectually (and writerly) lazy.


I have to disagree with you here. Unintentional errors in writing not intended to be private are careless and sloppy—in published work they are inexcusable. It's not just a matter of writing aesthetics or correctness—our entire culture has been travelling the road of careless and sloppy for some time now, in art and entertainment, education, the political process, manufacturing, customer service, personal relationships—you name it. We've raised a couple generations now that can't be bothered to put any effort into anything involving mental work (not really the word I want  :( ). Furthermore (and setting aside for the moment arguments about intention and the indeterminacy of meaning), it is the writer's responsiblity to express herself in a way that is comprehensible to her intended audience—whether or not the reader ultimately understands what is written or grasps its intent, he shouldn't need to decipher or guess at the meaning of what is written because of sloppy or incompetent writing. In the end, writing is a craft like cabinetry or weaving, and it is incumbent upon writers to become at least competent at the craft even if they don't master it.

Also, language isn't just about communication—it's also about expression and beauty. English is a wonderful language, highly flexible, capable of great subtlety and nuance, and in the hands of someone who has mastered the craft, of great beauty. Although French gets top marks for the aesthetics of its sound, more can be done with English, being composed as it is of words from several languages and without being hamstrung by the gender articles of most other European languages and the more strict grammar rules of many (German in particular). English has many more individual words (more than twice as many as German, even if you exclude technical and "invention" words like television), and the flexibility of its grammar allows us to rearrange the word order in a sentence in several ways to achieve specific aesthetic or emotional effects without either changing the meaning or being ungrammatical. This flexibility along with the "aural" characteristics of many English words allows for a rhythmic use of the language that seems to me rather unique, making possible the stunningly affective language of Shakespeare, for example, or the lyrics in rock songs.

"Simple," "careless," and "sloppy" all undermine significantly these aspects of the language which make it such a wonderful tool. (BTW, it occurs to me that "Simple and Sloppy" should be the slogan for television news.)

Your points are entirely valid, Hegelian. I do take exception to the idea that my generation isn't up to the same mental capabilities as those that have gone before us. >:(  I'm unable to prove anything to the contrary at the moment, but please allow that Gen X isn't the first to cry "Give me simplicity or give me death!". For instance, take a look at our less-than brilliant president who's worried about cloning adventures in human-animal hybrids.   ???  ??? (Which is another story altogether. Sheesh.)

My hope is that by letting my students take the simple way out of the "tough stuff", they will see that they can write something more challenging than internetese or three-word sentences and read something more challenging than the sports page. Many of their previous teachers have allowed them to get away with nothing harder than multiple choice worksheets. Not even cummulative exams, for Heaven's sake! By starting them with more difficult work, if not as challenging as one would hope, I can wean them towards what high school students should be capable of. If I continue to raise the bar year after year, they may just get somewhere. Baby steps. Baby steps.

I cannot speak for school systems across the board, of course, but due to NCL-B (No Child Left Behind), most American schools are suffering from two oppositional and equally powerful forces: RAISE TEST SCORES and GRADUATE THEM ALL, ESPECIALLY WITH HONORS. We cannot do both, and yet we are mandated to do so. It is statistically impossible to have more than 50% of students doing better than 50% on standardized tests. (You can't have six out of ten students beating six out of the same ten). That's what NCL-B requires us to do in the next few years. NCL-B also demands that we lower our drop-out rates to nearly zero in the same amount of time. If anyone of you can tell me how to make our classes more challenging, keep the less-able students in school, and make every student (including those with mental retardation and lesser learning disabilities) perform better than at least 50% of her/his peers, please tell me.

Yes, it's true that we need to work on standards, make sure that teachers are qualified to teach, etc. I just don't know that requiring my students to be as good a reader/writer as the standard English major is the way out. My students do leave high school knowing how to, at the very least, start well and get help when needed. No, it isn't an ideal system, but I cannot do everything. I wish I could.

Let's get from the grammar to maths ... I installed Inteenimator once and four cats in the family passed away long before their time.
So I've got three more tries...  ;D


Actually not, since I played for ages with InTeen installled, but without the occurrence of that or similiar problems.

I'm going to attempt the impossible for me - brevity. As this is a fun conversation but feels more and more out of place here, especially if I copy-paste in entire articles as I'm soooo tempted to do (but won't).


Oh I agree that "errors" in published non-fiction are Poor Form<tm> (noting the rules change and the piece might need to be grandfathered, and spelling is different in different parts of the world, oh and problems that are the proofreader's and typist's rather than the author if those are different, etc.) Fiction has its own rules. But I think (unless things have changed dramatically in the last few years) most published works of non-fiction meet fairly rigorous standards (peer-reviews or whatever else). It's general complaints about how people say things on the net - chat boards, blogs, etc. that bug me.

And the reader still has an obligation to *try* to understand. Many people are lazy writers, many are lazy readers as well.... one can imagine a young student thinking "that should have been spelled "there" and it's "their" - obviously they're dumb and I don't need to work my head around this." Any excuse not to try ;) Speed readers anonymous.


About *communicating* expression and beauty. Shared. Not just language, but any of the arts, are about communicating. Seeing something in a certain way and showing that to other people. If it's only meant to be seen by you and no one else (like a diary) that's different, but very rare. If the grammar rules are interferring with the communication, the rules are wrong.


And the ability to do more in English, which is a Germanic language, is directly related to English speakers calling for simplification - changing the rules to something that allows more flexibility and doesn't require hamstringing gender articles. When first spoken and written that way, the speakers were "wrong" grammatically. Rather than undermining the beauty, simplifying the language *allows* the part you're celebrating.


There's several studies that theorize an upper limit to human vocabulary. It seems that above a certain number, if more words are added to the language (think of all the words the computer age has added in recent years) then other words quickly become archaic or drop out of the popular lexicon. A human "working" vocabulary has an upper bound. It's interesting, in that while the dictionary has this large number, chances are the general population (the studies are of groups, not individuals) will only be able to use so many. If I can find a link, I'll post it (I have a strong hobbyist interest in linguistics, primarily Indo-European, so I read a lot of things of this nature, and don't know where I read it.)


Not posting whole blog articles, really not... only this piece, highly edited:


For those who, like me, are interested in this kind of thing, the blog article (well worth a read) is here:

http://www.amptoons.com/blog/

Scroll down to "Students Getting Dumber: The Sky Has Always Been Falling"

And Chapter 1 of the book _The Way We Were_ is here:

http://www.tcf.org/Publications/Education/waywewere-chpt1.htm

<argh, my idea of brief - but I bothered to type it in so I guess I'll post it and then go play sims> ;)

Well, I enjoyed reading it, Sagana. If you find that link or any other about linguistics I know I'd be happy for them. Since I started studying Finnish my interest in linguistics has been renewed.